Sunday, January 22, 2017

An alleged Russian hacker wanted for fraud has been detained in Spain and jailed pending extradition to the United States, police and a court spokesman said on Thursday.

Stanislav Lisov, a computer programmer, was wanted by US authorities, a spokesman for the Guardia Civil police force said. "He is accused of conspiracy to commit fraud via electronic media and conspiracy to commit fraud and abuse with computers," a spokesman for Spain's top-level National Court added.Lisov was detained last week in Barcelona's El Prat airport when he was about to board a flight, police said.He was jailed on January 13th after being questioned via videoconference by a judge in Madrid's National Court, which investigates suspected crimes that have an international remit.The judge decided to put him in prison as he does not live in Spain and could escape, and due to the "gravity of the offences."

Spain's first naked dining experience is opening on the island of Tenerife following the success of a similar venture in London.

Italian-born restaurateur Tony de Leonardis opens Innato, a nudist restaurant on the biggest of the Canary Islands, where diners will be asked to leave the accoutrements of modern life – namely their clothes and mobile phones – and"get back to basics".For the all-inclusive price of €70 diners will be invited to enjoy a buffet of organic dishes, all "served on the naked skin of a youth," according to an interview with De Leonardis published in La Opinion de Tenerife.In fact waiting staff will double up as serving tables wearing loin cloths and vine leaves to protect their modesty.De Leonardis has even overcome the problem of where to keep your wallet to pay your meal when you are in nothing but your birthday suit."We will charge diners at the door before they undress," he said.Innato will open in the town of San Isidro on January 20th. The venue, which includes seating for 44 diners, has tables set within private gardens planted with fruit trees, and will be lit entirely by candles.The new venture is inspired by The Bunyadi, London's first nudist restaurant which opened for three months during the summer and saw more than 46,000 people put their name down on the waiting list for a table.

RIYADH – Two suspect terrorists committed suicide during a shootout with security forces in the western Saudi city of Jeddah, authorities said on Saturday.

Authorities of Makkah region confirmed in a note on their official Twitter account that the two suspected terrorists committed suicide after a shootout during a security operation carried out on Saturday morning.

The note did not identify or specify the affiliation of the two suspects.

According to Saudi daily Sabq, Saudi security forces surrounded the site, where the two alleged terrorists were, and asked them to surrender to the authorities.

The suspects opened fire at the security forces, who responded.

However, the two suspects committed suicide by detonating explosive vests they were wearing after a failed attempt to flee.

Saudi Arabia’s Al Arabiya TV channel said the explosion took place in eastern Jeddah after a series of shots were heard.

The channel showed images of the destroyed building after the explosion.

So far, the Saudi interior ministry has not issued any statement confirming the information.

SEOUL – The United States has asked South Korea to arrest the brother of former Secretary-General of the United Nations, sources from Seoul’s justice ministry revealed on Saturday.

Washington asked Seoul to arrest Ban Ki-sang, younger sibling of ex-UN chief Ban Ki-moon, after the US Attorney General’s Office indicted him last week for the attempted bribery of an official from the Middle East in connection with a real estate deal.

South Korea’s justice ministry has begun to process the request and examine applicable laws, a senior Seoul official told news agency Yonhap.

Ban’s brother, an executive in the South Korean firm Keangnam, was reportedly entrusted by the company with selling a highrise building in Vietnam, Landmark 72, for $800 million.

He reportedly hired his son (and Ban’s nephew) Joo Hyun Bahn, a broker in New York, to secure the deal.

The US attorney general’s office claims that, through an intermediary, the father-son duo agreed to a $2.5 million bribe (of which they advanced around $500,000), for the official responsible for acquiring the property through a sovereign wealth fund.

While Bahn was arrested last week in New Jersey, Ban Ki-sang is considered a fugitive by authorities. He faces a variety of charges that could carry lengthy prison sentences.

Through a statement by his spokesperson, Ban Ki-moon declared he had no knowledge of the case and hoped the procedures would be “carried out strictly and transparently” to address any concerns.

The case could pose a serious threat to the older Ban’s political aspirations, particularly after he has stepped up public activities in recent weeks as part of what is perceived as a preliminary election campaign before he announces his candidature for the country’s top post.

However, Ban is yet to confirm if he will contest the election, at a time the country is in the throes of a major corruption scandal that led the Parliament to impeach President Park Geun-hye late last year.

GUATEMALA CITY - A Guatemalan judge on Wednesday ordered the arrest of Sammy and Jose Manuel Morales, the brother and son, respectively, of the country's president for allegedly embezzling state funds in 2013.

The head of the Sixth Criminal Court of First Instance, Silvia de Leon, said Wednesday during the first hearing that there are indications that both, due to their relationship to Jimmy Morales, could obstruct the investigation of the Prosecutor's Office if they remain at liberty.

SAO PAULO – Inmates continued their uprising on Friday for the seventh straight day at Alcacuz Prison in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Norte, where the armed forces were arriving to ensure security in the streets.

Friday dawned with the prisoners camped out on the roofs of the penitentiary in the Natal metropolitan region, where last weekend 26 people were brutally murdered, most of them members of the Crime Syndicate of the North (SDC), by order of the First Capital Command (PCC).

The evening before, inmates fought a pitched battle and, a spokesperson for the Rio Grande do Norte Military Police told EFE after the clash, “there could be some deaths” but “we don’t yet know how many.”

Police tried to contain the damage by throwing stun bombs and shooting rubber bullets into the conflict area, then rushed in to stop the war declared between the prison factions and remove the wounded, but the groups returned Friday to freely occupy the common areas of the prison complex.

The first rebellion in Alcacuz took place last Saturday after visiting hour, when prisoners of cell block 5, including members of the PCC, invaded cell block 4, where prisoners of the Crime Syndicate are held.

Authorities proceeded this week to transfer inmates to other jails around the state, which sparked a wave of attacks on buses and police stations.

Brazilian President Michel Temer authorized the use of the armed forces to guarantee safety in the streets, and the armed forces plan to begin to patrol Friday the main tourist attractions and avenues of Rio Grande do Norte.

Sunday, January 1, 2017

BAGHDAD – At least five people died and another 24 were injured Sunday in a suicide attacked carried out against a security checkpoint close to the southern Iraqi city of Najaf, a security source told EFE.

A group of armed assailants attacked a security checkpoint and detonated explosive-laden belts they were wearing when the officers tried to repel them.

The source said armed assailants had been traveling in a modern vehicle when they carried out the attack on a checkpoint in the district of Al-Qadisiyah, some 70 kilometers (43.5 miles) southwest of Najaf, a Shiite holy site some 240 km (150 mi) from Baghdad.

The death toll could go up, the source said, adding that the attack also caused material damage.

The attack has not been claimed by any group so far, and came the day after a double bombing killed at least 28 people in Baghdad.

SAO PAULO – About 50 people protested on Tuesday in Sao Paulo against homophobia after a street vendor was fatally beaten at a metro station while trying to defend a transsexual.

Luiz Carlos Ruas, nicknamed “Indian” for his ethnic roots, was brutally attacked by two men, ages 21 and 26, who beat and kicked him to death.

Carrying rainbow flags, the protests, including several transsexuals, gathered on Tuesday at the Pedro II metro station in Sao Paulo to denounce Ruas’s killing and criticize “hatred” against transsexuals.

“In 2007, I was attacked by nine men and lost a kidney. I only have one now. I know what it is to feel the violence in your own skin. I don’t want that to happen to my friends and colleagues. So, we’re here today asking for justice,” transsexual Renata Moraes Pessoa told EFE.

Moraes called for an “effective and definitive” response by the state to violence against transsexuals.

“It’s not possible to camouflage the truth and say that Brazil is not a transphobic country, because transphobia exists and the evidence is right here,” she said.

Also participating in the demonstration were several priests, including Julio Lancellotti, the director of the Street People Ministry, who paraphrased Pope Francis’s call for everyone to be “respected as brothers.”

“We’re here expressing our outrage over this terrible death and this senseless violence, he said.

The attackers, Ricardo Martins do Nascimento, 21, and Alipio Rogerio Belo dos Santos, 26, have been fugitives since Monday night, when police went to their homes to arrest them, according to what officials with the Sao Paulo Metropolitan Police told EFE.

The two attackers, who have no criminal records, were recognized by their relatives after seeing the images recorded by metro security cameras.

According to the police investigation, the incident began when Ruas tried to stop the two men’s attack on a homeless transsexual.